L’Encyclopédie de l’histoire du Québec / The Quebec History Encyclopedia

Fortification
and Defense of the Canadian Indian

[This
text was originally published in 1907 by the Bureau of American Ethnology
as part of its Handbook of American Indians North of Mexico .
It was later reproduced, in 1913, by the Geographic Board of Canada.
The work done by the American Bureau was monumental, well informed and
incorporated the most advanced scholarship available at the time. In
many respects, the information is still useful today, although prudence
should be exercised and the reader should consult some of the contemporary
texts on the history and the anthropology of the North American Indians
suggested in the bibliographic introduction to this section. The articles
were not completely devoid of the paternalism and the prejudices prevalent
at the time. While some of the terminology used would not pass the test
of our "politically correct" era, most terms have been left unchanged
by the editor. If a change in the original text has been effected it
will be found between brackets [.] The original work contained long
bibliographies that have not been reproduced for this web edition. For
the full citation, see the end of the text.]

The
simplest defences were furnished to the Indians by nature. In the forest
regions battles were fought in the shelter of trees, and in stony sections
from sheltering rocks. That war was waged and defensive measures were
necessary in prehistoric times is shown by the remains of fortifications
in the mound area of the United States.
These are of different types, the most common being the so-called hill
forts, where defensive walls of earth or stone surround a peak or hilltop
or skirt a bluff headland, as at Fort Ancient, Ohio. There are also
circular, square, octagonal, and other inclosures on the lowlands which
are generally supposed to have been built for defensive purposes, but
they could hardly have been effectual unless stockaded. There are, or
were until recently, earthen embankments and inclosures in New
York which, as Squier has shown, mark the
sites of palisaded forts similar to those of the Iroquois observed by
Champlain and Cartier. These were often polygonal, of double or triple
stockades, as that at Hochelaga which Cartier says was of "three courses
of rampires, one within another." Some were strengthened by braces and
had beams running round them near the top, where stones and other missiles
were placed ready to be hurled upon besiegers

The
walls of some of these fortifications were 20 ft. high. One of the polygonal
forts in W. New York ,
however, was overlooked by a hill from which arrows could easily be
shot into the inclosure. Most of the early figures of these forts represent
them as having a single entrance between overlapping ends of the stockade;
there is one, however (Underhill, News from America , 1638),
which shows two overlappings. When first seen by the whites most of
the villages from Florida
to the Potomac
were protected with surrounding stockades, which are represented in
De Bry as single with one opening where the ends overlap. The construction
of these surrounding palisades was practically the same, whether they
inclosed a single house or 50 houses. In some sections a ditch was usually
dug, both within and outside of the palisade. A few of the forts in
S. New England
were square, but the circular form generally prevailed (Willoughby in
Am. Anthrop ., VIII, No. 1, 1908). The fortress built by King
Philip in the swamp at South Kensington, R.I., consisted of a double
row of palisades, flanked by a great abatis, outside of which was a
deep ditch. At one corner a gap of the length of one log was left as
an entrance, the breastwork here being only 4 or 5 ft. high; and this
passage was defended by a well-constructed blockhouse, whilst the ditch
was crossed by a single log which served as a bridge. Stockaded villages
were also common as far W. as Wisconsin
. Stone walls which C. C. Jones considered
defensive, have been observed on Stone mt., mt.
Yona
, and other peaks of N.
Georgia. De
Soto found strongly fortified villages
in his passage through the Gulf states
and Arkansas
.

Vancouver
( Voy ., III, 289, 1798) mentions villages on Kupreanof id.,
situated on the summits of steep, almost inaccessible rocks and fortified
with strong platforms of wood laid upon the most elevated part of the
rock, which projected at the sides so as to overhang the declivity.
At the edge of the platform there was usually a sort of parapet of logs
placed one upon another. This type, according to Swanton, was quite
common on the N. W. coast. The Skagit
tribe, according to Wilkes, combined dwellings and forts, and similar
custom was followed by some of the Raids clans. Wilkes mentions also
inclosures 400 ft. long, which were constructed of pickets about 30
ft. long thrust deep into the ground, the interior being divided into
roofed lodges.

The
Clallam also had a fort of pickets, 150 ft. square, roofed over, and
divided into compartments for families. No stockades seem to have been
used by the Ntlakyapamuk, but fortresses or fortified houses were at
one time in use in a few places. These defences, according to Boas,
consisted of logs placed lengthwise on the ground one above another
and covered with brush and earth, loopholes being left at places between
the logs. According to the same authority, some of the stockades of
British Columbia
were provided with underground passages as a means of escape. It has
been a general custom of the Indian of the Plains, when in danger of
being attacked by a superior force, to dig a pit or pits in the loose,
generally sandy soil, throwing the earth around the margin to increase
the height of the defence, the bank of a creek or a gully being selected
when within reach, as defense of one side only was necessary. Native
drawings of some of these defences are given by Mooney (17 th Rep. B.A.E.,
271-274, 1898.)

Source:
James WHITE, ed., Handbook of Indians of Canada
, Published as an Appendix to
the Tenth Report of the Geographic Board of Canada
, Ottawa
, 1913, 632p., pp. 171-172.